The memoirs of a Nigerian on the path of self discovery

Remedies for a Broken Heart

As humans, we have all suffered one heartbreak or the other. The rebound is usually slow and painful for some , while for others it is a walk over. Having some experience on heartbreaks and finding myself still alive, I’m here to offer you my own remedies for healing a broken heart. If you want to wallow in self pity, hate and tears, move on – to my next post. 🙂 But If you really want to be happy, keep reading!

I do agree that the trip to self happiness is not an easy one. You must make an effort, a real conscious effort to be happy. There are days that you will want to lie down in bed all day and drown yourself with a lot of comfort food. You will not care about how you look or if you are about to get run over by a truck ( like me).

OK. on second thoughts, I think I will let Bubu do the honours. Bunmi (Bubu as I fondly call her) is one hell of a sista. She saw me go through self-abusing relationships and also went through one herself. Although we don’t see eye – to – eye on the selection process for “The Man”, she is always supportive of my decisions, and gives me virtual hankies to cry and blow my nose into whenever I suffer a fall.

While writing, I thought that since Bubu always sees me through the storm she should share her own ideas as well. It was so well written that I decided to adopt the whole script. I’m sure to come up with another post on my own remedies, but for the meantime, I shall withdraw into the corner, and let someone else take center stage…

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Okay so my lovely friend told me to write a guide about how to get over a breakup and I must confess, I have never been more excited! Before you judge me, I’m not excited about the bit that says “Break-up”, only about the bit that says “Getting over”, because believe me, there is nothing better than the feeling you get when you know your heart’s been broken and its finally healing up. Like my favourite book says: “He is gone, you are back”. This could be a she too, so if you are a male reader, feel free to substitute…

Just so you know that I am vast and experienced in what am talking about, I used to be(emphasis on the “used to”) a serial break up girl. Not like breaking up with so many guys, but rather with the same guy for 2, no -12 times to be precise, over and over and yet going back each time despite the fact that he treated me like crap and was a constant parasite sucking all my lifeline and never giving me anything back until the twelfth time that I finally learnt the golden rules of dealing with heartbreak and coming out of it successfully, this has led to Bunmi’s 12 golden rules of how to deal with a heartbreak…ENJOY

FRIENDS MATTER: Surround yourself with lots and lots of great, supportive and optimistic friends that are ready to support you, be there for you and of course tell you all the terrible things about him. (Heheheh!) This is the most important thing to do after you break up: you cannot afford to be bored and lonely. If not, like me, you will go back again and again. The silence and the void you will experience after he is gone has to be filled quickly, if not you will soon forget all about the things that made you leave him and go back to him. It will be “I will rather manage him than go back to my empty apartment, he is not that bad na, is he?

LOVE SONGS ARE A NO-NO: Never listen to love song at least not in the first one month. Seriously, don’t.

HIT THE DELETE BUTTON: Till you fully get over him and are on your way to recovery, you need to eliminate anything that reminds you of him, which includes his phone number, the texts and the cards that he sent to you. However exclude valuable items he gave to you like diamonds, clothing or in my case the BlackBerry… why should my gorgeous item suffer for his mistake, huh?

LET’S BE FRIENDS? NO, THANKS: Don’t try to be “friends” just yet; your healing will depend greatly on the nature of your relationship. If you were in love with him, it is advisable not to be his friend at least not in the first two months. You will get there but you not there yet. Talking to him will only remind you of things you used to do together; you don’t want to get sucked into that again. You know how the doctor will tell you not to expose an open wound to water until it heals? Its just like that for a broken relationship too. Heal up before trying to be friends again.

BE SELFISH: This is very important especially if you guys were together for a while and you came to really care about him alot. Don’t think about if is he feeding well, or asking your self if he is happy… Forget it!!! At this stage you’re allowed to be selfish; care about yourself and not him. He had his chance and he blew it, HE IS GONE AND YOU ARE BACK!

NEVER GET A REBOUND: Now I know this goes against everything you read about breakups, but hear me out: After I would break up with my ex, I would always go for a rebound. After one date, I would realize how my rebound didn’t have one or two other things my ex possessed, then I would panic and go back to my ex. I felt sh**y knowing I was better than the sh**ty man sitting right there in front of me and eating with his mouth opened or something. It took me two years to finally realize that I was dating this men for the wrong reasons, hence they weren’t right for me. I finally realized that the rebounds needed to stop and I needed to breathe!

LET OUT THE EMOTIONS: Be it ice cream with your girls, crying and shouting or like me, you need to express what you are feeling; grieve the relationship. Afterwards it is dead and let it go.

GO OUT: Do the things you were not able to do when you were together, for me it was visiting my old friends.
ITS OKAY TO DAY DREAM: Fantasize about the man that God is truly preparing you for. It didn’t work out with your ex for a reason.

NOT GUILTY!: After i broke up with my ex I felt a lot of guilt. Guilt of staying with him after I new he wasn’t good for me. Guilt of being to afraid to be “alone” and therefore sticking with him cause of it. guilt of not being patient for the right man. Guilt of disobeying God. Whatever guilt you are feeling, LET IT GO!
FORGIVE: It’s easy to resent him so much for all your pain and begin to hate him. This cannot happen as he will always have a hold over your heart if you hate (plus you will go to hell). You need to forgive your ex and forgive yourself too. You definitely learnt a thing or two from the relationship. I learnt not to be too harsh in judging the next man in my life.

This is the most important and that is why I have saved it for the last, and I must confess it is very personal. Now that I think about it, it made everything easier. PRAY, PRAY, PRAY and PRAY some more. you need to talk to God to ‘HEAL YOU’, heal you broken heart. On those cold nights after my friends had all gone home and I wanted to pick the phone and call him back, I found out that talking to God about how I felt, how my heart was feeling and asking him to please heal me and help me really did a lot of miracles. Also above all, I prayed to God that despite wasting my time with this “Mr. Wrong” He should still give me the bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. It worked! 😀

Today, I am happily in love with a guy that loves God first and then loves me second. He cares deeply about how I feel and would never intentionally hurt me. I have so much peace with him and he brings me joy. I have forgotten about all the pain I went through because they all led me to him. I am now friends with my ex, simply because my heart is fully healed from the hurt he caused me.
I hope this helps!

Hahaha, I can't stop laughing either! If you are strong enough to throw him over the cliff, you certainly are not heart broken – you are just a beautiful lady scorned, and you know what they say about "Hell hath no fury…?" I should learn from you too, haha!